The Brit school that calls in Mozart, Verdi, Blake to calm disruptive pupils!

London, January 19 (ANI): A school in Britain makes students listen to Mozart and Verdi's music apart from transcribing William Blake's poetries, as a part of punishment for unruly behaviour.

West Park School in Derby holds a two-hour detention on Fridays each week when the students are asked to listen to Mozart's Requiem and Verdi's Aida in silence.

Headmaster of the school, Brian Walker, believes the step has been very effective.

"I try to pick music to suit the season such as oratorios at Easter, or even medieval plain-song near Christmas, and I can hear the groans as it starts but I always ensure the volume is high," the Telegraph quoted him as saying.

He added: "Hopefully, I open their ears to an experience they don't normally have and it seems many of them don't want to have it again - so it's both educational and acts as a deterrent."

He insisted that the number of pupils who lose lesson time to unruly behaviour has fallen from around 60 pupils to a core group of 20.

Walker revealed that he had introduced a similar detention programme "Bach to basics," four years ago.

He added: "We used to have detentions on a Saturday but a lack of parental support meant we had to rethink that and we came up with a two-hour Friday detention.

"Good pupil behaviour is critical to our success. So we introduced a new behaviour system, of which the detentions were a part, and the effect was transformational.

"Detentions are always supervised by myself or the deputy head and are run to a precise regime of seating arrangements and total silence. My deputy prefers to take pupils through their times tables rather than a DVD in the second part of the two hours.

"The pupils seem to really like Air on a G String by Bach and they respond well to Mozart. They struggle with Medieval Plainsong, which I suppose is an acquired taste."

Students seem to have varied opinions on the nature of punishment.

Ryan, a pupil in the school, said: "Two hours for a school detention is a long time to sit in silence. You really don't want to go back there."

Another, Kieran, said: An hour of Mr Walker's music is a real killer."

Meanwhile, Charlotte, another student said: "The music can be relaxing but you wouldn't want it too often." (ANI)